After roots such as carrots are peeled by hand or by machine, the two ends of a root are often found to be discolored or otherwise damaged on account of the greater pressure to which they are subjected in the peeling process. It therefore becomes necessary to trim off these damaged ends before the product is marketed.
While manual topping or crowning of the roots limits the amount of waste, such a process is relatively time-consuming and correspondingly expensive. Various devices have therefore already been proposed for automatically trimming such roots, as by directing the roots into cylindrical or tapering pockets from which they partially project so as to facilitate their topping by a relatively movable blade. Another known solution resides in manually securing the roots to a conveyor with their ends sticking out on opposite sides so as to be cut off on moving past respective knives.
All these known devices are of limited efficiency and produce considerable waste on account of the variations of such roots in both lengths and thickness.